


the princess duck costume conundrum

by kellifer_fic



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Amusement Park, Costumes, Derek literally cannot use his words, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-06
Updated: 2015-05-06
Packaged: 2018-03-29 09:08:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3890629
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kellifer_fic/pseuds/kellifer_fic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I'm swapping you and Scott," Allison announced, dropping the Big Bad Wolf costume head in Derek's lap. He looked up at her, one eyebrow raised and it wasn't just because she'd waltzed into the male locker room unannounced.</p>
<p>He was just surprised it had taken her this long to make this particular decision.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the princess duck costume conundrum

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dapatty](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dapatty/gifts).



> This is a quick little gift fic for dapatty for continuing to be awesome and making me podfic covers and a dozen other little ways of being lovely.
> 
> I apologise in advance to anyone that has done this particular kind of work if this is horribly inaccurate.

"I'm swapping you and Scott," Allison announced, dropping the Big Bad Wolf costume head in Derek's lap. He looked up at her, one eyebrow raised and it wasn't just because she'd waltzed into the male locker room unannounced.

He was just surprised it had taken her this long to make this particular decision.

"What put you over the edge?" Derek asked, holding the wolf head out in front of him and waggling it.

"I couldn't take Scott's tragic sighing anymore," Allison admitted, dropping down onto the bench seat next to Derek in front of his open locker. 

"He's fine with taking on Princess Quackers?" Derek asked. He'd been Princess Quackers for about five months and he was secure enough not to sweat being in a princess duck costume, but not all men could say the same. 

"Are you kidding? He's ecstatic," Allison enthused brightly. 

Derek had to admit Princess Quackers was a pretty sweet gig. She was a cute costume and all the littler kids loved her. Derek spent most of his time getting hugged or taking pictures holding kids aloft and it wasn't a bad way to earn a dollar. The Big Bad Wolf, however, was mostly for the older kids and teenagers and a popular target for the kinds of children than just want to kick someone in the butt. 

Plus, the BBW had Stiles as his minder and, well, Derek was self-aware enough to admit that it wasn't just Stiles' knack for thwarting attacking children that had him wishing he'd been partnered with Stiles. It might've had more to do with the huge honking crush he'd had on Stiles since he'd started at _Argent's World O' Fun_.

"Am I... keeping Lydia?" Derek asked, trying to be tactful. Lydia was an amazing girl and now one of his best friends, but she was a terrible minder. She paid more attention to her phone than him and even let Derek take a header into a trash can once. The costumes weren't that great when it came to peripheral vision and the costume hosts were pretty reliant on the minders to steer them out of harm's way. The Princess Quackers costume was a little more forgiving than most but Derek still had trouble whenever Lydia left him to his own devices to have a heated text argument with her on-again-off-again boyfriend.

Allison snorted indelicately. "No way. I'll send you out with Stiles," she said. "Otherwise you'll be back here in about ten minutes covered in bruises and ice cream sandwiches."

Derek hoped his face didn't betray his happiness at the news, but by the way Allison smirked at him, he knew he'd given himself away.

*

Stiles was running late which was apparently the status quo for him according to Scott, so Derek was already dressed and out of the break room when Stiles skidded to a stop with a breathless, "Sorry Scotty, jeep wouldn't start."

Costume hosts weren't allowed to take their heads off outside the break room. Derek figured with the Big Bad Wolf costume it probably wouldn't have been as jarring to any customers as him taking off the Princess Quackers head, but he didn't want to risk the reprimand if Gerard, the owner of the park and a much less tolerant human being than their shift manager, Allison, saw him. The Big Bad Wolf also didn't really allow for any kind of verbal communication so Derek figured he'd let Stiles know about the change over on their first break. For now, he gave Stiles a thumb's up with one fuzzy paw and Stiles smirked, took a second to sling his backpack through the locker room door and then took hold of the paw Derek was still holding out to lead him outside.

It was nice having Stiles for a minder. Stiles pretty much held onto him whenever he was walking unlike Lydia who'd basically only prodded him in the right direction with a pointy elbow if he was going to fall over/into/on something. When he wasn't posing for pictures and Stiles wasn't occupied waylaying attacking ninja children, Stiles burbled happily about his day, his weekend, his dad and anything else that came to mind. Derek hadn't really had a chance to properly talk to Stiles before and even though the conversation was purely one-sided, it was still pleasant and he tried to hide the fact that he was laughing at Stiles' antics and stories most of the time by shaking his paws and hamming up the whole _bad guy_ thing whenever kids that were old enough not to run screaming approached.

"Man, you suddenly got _really_ good at this. Did you take grumpy lessons from Derek or something?" Stiles observed, waggling his eyebrows. Stiles was forced to stop when Derek froze at that because they'd been walking between _Western Gulch_ and _Auto Town_ so Stiles had hold of his paw. He tugged a little when he noticed Derek's stillness and said, "You alright?"

Derek recovered himself and waved Stiles off as best he could, indicating they could start walking again by making an over-exaggerated shooing motion. Stiles gave him a little worried frown and didn't move.

"You sure you're okay? Not overheating are you? We can go back to the break room early."

Derek was touched by Stiles' concern for a moment, but then felt like a bit of an idiot for it because Stiles' concern was for _Scott_. Apparently Stiles thought Derek was just a giant grumpy guts which was definitely not the vibe Derek wanted to give off. He hated that people mistook his shyness for gruffness. 

Derek gestured again for them to continue and Stiles raised an eyebrow. "Seriously, we don't want another Greenburg."

Greenburg was currently cleaning bathrooms at the park because he'd managed to throw up inside Hoppity Frog's head and then proceeded to remove it and collapse on an eight year-old boy.

That was a pretty traumatic day for everyone involved.

"Fine," Stiles sighed when Derek turned Stiles around by the shoulders and gave him a little shove, trying not to smile at the way Stiles reached back for his hand automatically.

Stiles was _good_. He steered Derek effortlessly around, was polite but firm with the kids that tried anything and equally firm but a little less polite with the parents that didn't stop the kids that attempted to pull his tail or kick him. The Big Bad Wolf got a lot of teenage girls asking for hugs and photos and it should have been awesome. 

"Bad boy appeal. If only they knew you were a complete marshmallow under the suit," Stiles said, flicking Derek on the snout as the latest group of giggling barely-teens retreated.

Derek knew he should be enjoying the change of pace but instead he found himself missing the little kids, their adoration and excitement. He could see why someone like Scott would be completely deflated by the end of the day as he watched another little girl steer clear of him with a wobbly bottom lip and big scared eyes. 

They spent another uneventful hour wandering the park and it was nearing their break time when Stiles dropped his hand and made an almost wounded noise.

Derek wanted to ask, but couldn't. He could only try and follow Stiles' sight line and see what had caught his attention and was making his face do... whatever it was doing. Derek was surprised to see that Stiles was looking at _Scott_ , or more accurately at that moment, at Princess Quackers.

"I know, I know, pathetic, right?" Stiles lamented and Derek was _really_ lost. Was Stiles calling _him_ pathetic? Did he really dislike Derek that much, think he was that much of a loser? 

Derek waggled his overlarge paws, at a loss how to really communicate anything else other than confusion and Stiles rolled his eyes.

"I'll do it in my own time, okay?" Stiles said, crossing his arms and raising his chin and now Derek really didn't know what was going on. "I'm... I'm working up to it."

Derek waved his paws again but Stiles must have gotten some kind of meaning from them that Derek didn't intend because his eyes narrowed and two bright-red splotches of color appeared on his cheeks.

"Okay, _fine_. I'll do it right now. Will that make you happy? God, you're such a pushy wolf," Stiles snapped. He wasn't moving, although his body has tilted in Scott's direction like he was having some kind of internal war with himself. Derek took a step toward him, having no idea what was happening but wanting to stave off whatever confrontation Stiles thought they needed to have when Stiles sniffed and added, "I will _tell_ Derek that I'm a creepy loser that's been creepily staring at him and has a huge, _creepy_ crush on him and he'll laugh at me and I'll have to quit and you'll get stuck with _Lydia_ who will _abandon_ you. Is that what you want?"

Derek froze in place, because _what_? Stiles was breathing hard, now most of his face pink instead of just his cheeks but he must've been waiting for Derek, or _Scott_ to stop him after his little speech because Derek's inability to move meant that Stiles pivoted on his heel and stomped towards Princess Quackers determinedly.

"Wait!" Derek blurted, but he was hopelessly muffled by the suit. He didn't know any of the hand signals Scott and Stiles would have worked out for communication so he did the only thing he could think of. 

He awkwardly shuffle-ran at Stiles, meaning to grab a hold of him or maybe even tackle him. Stiles looked over his shoulder at the last minute, saw Derek coming at him and side-stepped neatly. Derek went barreling by, too much of his weight tipped forward because the wolf suit and Princess Quackers were very different and he managed to land in an undignified heap at Princess Quacker's webbed feet.

He heard a muffled squeak come from the duck suit, Princess Quackers' head piece a little more forgiving when it came to making noise, but that was when a group of about six eight year old boys landed on him, stealing the opportunity that had presented itself without hesitation.

"Hey! Get off him!" he heard Stiles yell, sounding a little panicked. Derek was face down and he couldn't get any leverage. He was mostly protected by the suit and Scott was making a valiant effort to pluck the kids off him as fast as he could, but one particularly enthusiastic boy managed to bounce his head at just the right angle that his nose connected with the internal frame of the wolf snout and Derek felt a burst of pain and more worryingly, blood.

"Jeremy Josiah Green, you get off that wolf right now!" Derek heard a woman's voice bawl and the last of the weight disappeared off his back, allowing Derek to finally be able to roll over. It made his head spin horribly and Derek thought there might be another Greenburg incident, but then Stiles was there, filling up his vision with his worried, pale face and saying, "Scott, dude, are you okay? Please be alive in there!"

Derek saw a Prince Quacker wing tap Stiles on the shoulder and then, "Uhm Scoooo."

"What? Derek, what?" Stiles said, frowning at the duck costume in confusion.

"He said _he's_ Scott. That's Derek," Lydia joined them to say, pointing her phone at Derek lying prone on the ground.

"What?" Stiles said faintly, all color draining from his face.

"Screw the rules," Scott said, voice clear as a bell and Derek moved enough to see that Scott had removed his character head and was crouching back down by Derek's side so he could pry the wolf head off him. "Oh, yikes," he added when Derek's face was suddenly touched by cool, clean air.

"Derek?" Stiles breathed out, still sounding a little shocked. Lydia was talking into her walkie, asking for a medic and there was a woman standing near them, holding a kid by the back of his shirt and worrying her bottom lip with her teeth.

"I'm so sorry," she said. She jabbed a piece of paper at Stiles who took it without looking at her, still staring at Derek. "If there's any... _any_ medical bills or anything please, I'll pay."

"I'm sure it's not as bad as it looks," Scott said over his shoulder, trying to reassure her while still fussing over Derek. How bad _does_ it look, Derek wanted to ask, but kept his mouth closed because he could feel blood on his upper lip and he was queasy enough without introducing a mouthful of blood to the mix.

"Still!" the woman insisted and Stiles seemed to break out of his trance long enough to deal with her as Deaton, the park medic, arrived with his kit.

"We'll contact you," Stiles said, ushering the woman and her son aside.

Deaton's concerned face filled Derek's vision at that moment, blocking everything else out.

*

Derek didn't get a chance to see Stiles again before he was whisked off to the emergency room, Greenburg transporting him in the park's courtesy bus. He was sitting in the waiting room with an icepack on his face to stop the bleeding when someone cleared their throat next to him and sat down.

Derek was expecting it to be Greenburg, the guy had disappeared in the hopes of finding a vending machine that would accept his overly crumpled dollars, but it was Stiles with a careful face and Derek's leather jacket in his hands.

"Hey," Stiles said. His shoulders were a little hunched and he looked more unsure of himself than Derek had ever seen him. Derek was used to Stiles being loud and jittery and it was weird to see this quiet, sheepish version of him. 

"Hi," Derek said, blinking at Stiles over the icepack. 

"Soooo..." Stiles said, hefted a sigh and made a helpless gesture with his hands after he'd draped Derek's jacket across his lap. "That was mortifying."

"Which bit exactly?" Derek asked.

"Ugh, I know, okay? I'm sorry."

"Stiles, you're fine, this wasn't your fault."

"It kinda was."

"Could've happened to anyone."

"That's so kind of you to say. Really, why are you so nice?"

"I kinda got the impression that you thought I was a socially inept jerk."

"What?" Stiles spluttered, eyes wide. "No way. That couldn't be further from the truth."

"Well I know that _now_ ," Derek allowed and Stiles blushed again. Derek could get used to that. It was pretty freaking adorable.

"I won't make it weird. You can have Lydia back."

"You think that's what I want?" Derek asked, surprised.

"Uh, I guess? You ate it pretty spectacularly to stop me from telling you, well, not _you_ but what I thought was you-"

This would be the part where Derek should lean over and silence Stiles with a kiss, if he wasn't basically wearing an icepack and a blood goatee. As it was, Derek just resorted to thwapping Stiles in the forehead with the icepack, startling a laugh out of him. 

"Hey, ow!" he exclaimed, still laughing but also rubbing his head.

"You're such a dummy."

"What?"

"I've been, how did Lydia put it, staring moonily at you for _months_."

"I... you have?"

"I think the only person that didn't know that was you."

"And Scott, because Scott would have totally... oh, that rat bastard!" Stiles exclaimed. "He _did_ this."

"I'm starting to think it was a group effort," Derek said, taking the icepack off his face and poking at his nose with his other hand. Stiles arrested his hand and tugged it back down. He probably didn't mean to keep a hold of it or put it on his own thigh, but then when he realized what he'd done he gave Derek an uncertainly hopeful glance from under his lashes which turned into a full-blown grin when Derek just squeezed the thigh under his hand and then turned his hand over so their fingers laced together.

"I really want to kiss you but... uh..." Stiles made a flappy hand with his free one around his own face and then grimaced.

"I know. I don't want our kiss to be a horror show that you'd have to brace yourself for either," Derek said. "Plus, it'd probably hurt."

"Can I get a kiss raincheck for as soon as you have the all-clear and are gore-free?" Stiles asked, eyebrows raised in an eager arc.

" _You_ could kiss me now?" Derek said and tapped the side of his forehead, above the blood and the icepack. 

Stiles darted forward immediately like he was just waiting for an in. At the last moment he hesitated though so Derek moved his face into Stiles. It was more of a lip bump than a kiss but it was sweet and nice and Stiles' cheeks were ruddy when he dropped back into his chair. 

"Derek Hale?" a nurse asked from the edge of the waiting room, holding a clipboard and looking around.

"Yes," Derek said and stood. He looked at his and Stiles' joined hands and said, "Uh, did you... would you want to come with?"

"I think I'm pretty much attached now," Stiles said with a smile, shaking their held hands aloft.

"Cool," Derek said.

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi [on tumblr!](http://kellifer-k.tumblr.com/)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] The Princess Duck Costume Conundrum](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4560780) by [dapatty](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dapatty/pseuds/dapatty)




End file.
